Annual Walking Week in Great Glen

Our Annual Walking week was in The Great Glen this year and we all arrived at our country house near Drumnadrochit within 2 hours of each other last Saturday. This was the largest number ever to participate in The Last of the Summer Wine walking holiday making a total of 7 men and 5 women. As the house was fairly remote this year we planned to eat out 3 times and the rest of the week the ladies provided us with superb meals. Tom was the last to arrive on Saturday and he had a car loaded with enough wine and beer to sink a battleship. I am happy to report that most of the wine has disappeared but there will be a load of beer returning to Langholm just in time for the Cornet's Street Party at the Golf Club on Sunday. The plan was to walk at least 40 miles during the week and I am happy to report this target has been achieved although not everybody walked every day.

Day 1 on Sunday was a nice easy 7 mile walk to set us up for the more difficult walks later in the week. We started at the first Lock on the Caledonian Canal at Inverness and walked to the point where it entered Loch Ness. There were a good number of boats on the canal with most of them being of Scandinavian origin. 

The first Lock on the canal and 3 boats waiting to move out of it into the canal. One Swedish and the other 2 were from Norway. 

On Monday Gaye and Aileen and myself decided to visit The Black Isle to see the famous Moray Firth Dolphins.
We were very lucky and within 5 minutes of parking our car at Chandonry Point near Fortrose we witnessed a spectacular display of Dolphin aerobatics for about 15 minutes before they all disappeared. This photograph does not give a true impression of how spectacular they were as managing to catch them in mid air was almost impossible. They were only about 10 to 15 yards from the shore but kept appearing at different points along the shore and anticipating just where they would do their leaps was almost impossible.  

Aileen and Gaye at Chandonry Point with about 25 Dolphin watchers behind them. The best time to view them is about 1 hour after slack tide and we just managed to arrive at exactly the right time. 

After the excitement of watching the Dolphins we headed up the coast to Rosemarkie where we had Coffee and Cake in a lovely Beach Cafe run by the local community. While we were visiting the Black Isle the rest of the walkers were walking round Loch Affric for the toughest walk of the week and a distance of about 11 miles. 

Tuesday was set to be the best day of the week for weather and we set out to walk Loch Oich and the Caledonian Canal sections from North Laggan to Fort Augustus. This was a distance of about 10 miles and with the weather hotting up to almost 70F it proved to be a fantastic days walking. Logistically it was quite complicated with an hours drive in 2 cars to North Laggan and then Elspeth and Gaye would meet us in Fort Augustus at the end of the walk to run the 2 drivers back to their cars. 

As you can see from this photograph of Loch Oich the scenery was just stunning

Lunch at the Bridge of Oich swing bridge and the opportunity to relax and watch several boats coming through and waiting for the swing bridge to open. It takes quite a long time to navigate the canal as their are 29 Locks and 8 Swing Bridges to be negotiated therefore great patience is required. On a day like this nobody was in any hurry and it looked a great way of spending a day on a boat.

Another European Boat navigates the Canal but this time it is from Holland. 

The last leg of the Tuesday walk and a refreshing drink among the trees is the best way to cool down.

The entrance to Loch Ness and a series of 5 Locks to be navigated at Fort Augustus. This was the end of our walk and it was just lovely to sit and have a few beers at the side of the canal while our drivers collected the cars from North Laggan.

Most of the walkers had a free day on Wednesday but the ones visiting the Black Isle to see the Dolphins were unlucky as they never appeared. This is our Thursday walk which involved driving to one of the highest points on the Great Glen Way and then walking back to Drumnadrochit. The walk included new forest plantation, old forest, and moorland so we had a real variety of landscape to negotiate. The new forest area was a combination of both conifers and deciduous and was a real treat to walk through. 

Our lunch time stopping place above Loch Ness with an almost 1000ft drop to the Loch.

Coffee and cake back in Drumnadrochit after our lovely walk.

Tom managed to sleep while holding his bottle of beer for almost 30 minutes and not a drop was spilt.

Pre dinner nibbles provided by the ladies and very tasty they were too. 

On our Thursday walk at the highest and remotest point we saw many signs like this.

Eventually we came to this sign and a path to what must be the remotest cafe in the UK. As it was just near the starting point of our walk we decided not to bother visiting the cafe but afterwards I think we all regretted this and maybe had missed out on something a bit special.
The weather for Friday was looking terrible so Gaye and I decided to head for home as I have a Buccleuch Centre function on Saturday as Duty Manager and it was not worth driving all day on Saturday and then being out until almost 1.00am in the morning. The 8 remaining walkers were planning a lazy day and then dinner out at the Fiddlers in the evening. It has been a lovely week blessed with great weather for 5 out of the 6 days. I would like to take the opportunity of thanking the many friends who have sponsored us and I am happy to report that we have raised over £700 for Macmillan Cancer Support.